Monday, 3rd July
Starting my week of Work Experience at Gladstone’s Library I wasn’t sure what to expect when I arrived. Since it was Founder’s Day, an annual event at the Library, it wasn’t the average day of work. We had to prepare the Reading Room for a large number of people and therefore my job involved tidying the shelves, organising chairs and moving furniture. After this the Interns showed me the rest of the library, including the Annex which is home to a large collection of the library’s books. After lunch was the Founder’s Day panel event which lasted for most of the rest of the working day. When it ended we packed away the chairs and returned the Reading Rooms to normal.
Tuesday, 4th July
Since Monday was such an unusual day, Tuesday was more introduction rather than work. We were taught how to open up the library and circulate returned books which involved using the Heritage Cirqa computer system. Until lunch time we had the long but important job of stock checking the books in the Gladstone Room - a job that sounds easier than it was! In the afternoon the Library Assistant, Gary, showed us how to deal with email enquiries and how to compose an answer to questions from the general public. I finished the day in archives with the Archives Assistant Siân.
Wednesday, 5th July
The morning consisted of the usual circulating of books in the library and then finishing listing of the journals for the archives. This wasn’t too time consuming so afterwards we helped stack books in the Annex. By lunchtime I had completed my time in Library work so after lunch it was time to start some Marketing tasks. These involved scheduling and writing my own social media posts on behalf of the Library and sourcing free-to-use images for the posts.
Thursday, 6th July
Today I started by circulating the books which involved taking note of which books had been returned and then taking them to where they belong. After that we helped Gary move stacks of historic books in the Annex. When the library jobs had been completed I worked in Marketing again with the Marketing Manager learning about the maintenance of the email database, an important job to ensure that subscribers to the Gladstone’s Library newsletter keep up to date with current events. After lunch our job was to research local events in the North Wales area that the Library should be aware in order to target the marketing to people who would be attending those events.
Friday, 7th July
For the last day of my Work Experience I circulated the books and returned to my job in Marketing. The first task of the day was writing a press release regarding an upcoming event with an author. Afterwards we had to compile a distribution list of local editors and event managers of newspapers to send the press release to. After lunch I typed up my Work Experience Diary to be posted on the website.
By Mia Mori